Ben Stokes has urged England not to ‘coast’ in Sunday’s fifth and final Ashes Test at Sydney as they try to limit the damage to 3–2 in a game that could have repercussions beyond this tour.
Victory would leave managing director Rob Key and head coach Brendon McCullum with a stronger claim to keep their jobs, despite the admission of both men that England were not given proper preparation for the start of the series at Perth. ECB officials have already let it be known that there is no appetite at Lord’s for sweeping changes.
But public anger will grow if England succumb to their fourth defeat out of five, heaping more pressure on chairman Richard Thompson and chief executive Richard Gould to take action after a trip that began amid widespread optimism.
Stokes’s job seems safe, partly because there is no plausible alternative, but his own case would be strengthened by a victory to back up the two-day win on a Melbourne pitch ruled ‘unsatisfactory’ by the ICC – a result that left Australian cricket covering its tracks by forcing MCG curator Matt Page to explain himself to the media on what would have been the third morning of the Test.
And he has made it clear to his players that now is not the time to wind down in what will be England’s last Test match until early June, when New Zealand begin a three-match series at Lord’s.
‘The Ashes for us, unfortunately, hasn’t gone the way we wanted it to, but we’ve got one more game in a big series,’ he said. ‘So although we can’t get the thing that we came here for, we’ve still got a chance to go out there and win a game of cricket.
Ben Stokes has urged England not to coast in the final Test match of the Ashes
The result of the Sydney Test match could have huge repercussions on the futures of Rob Key (left) and Brendan McCullum (right)
‘Coming to the end of a long tour, where the series is done, the one thing you don’t want to see – and I don’t think I will – is coasting through this game and seeing what happens. And although we get to go home in eight or nine days’ time, any thought of that can wait until then.’
Not many players have emerged from this trip with their reputations enhanced, though Josh Tongue has looked a serious prospect while taking 12 wickets at 18 at Adelaide and Melbourne, and Jacob Bethell’s second-innings 40 at the MCG confirmed his promise.
But Stokes also warned his players not to ‘get individual or insular’ over the next few days at the SCG, adding: ‘As soon as someone starts thinking about their own performances, it becomes quite easy to see through.’
Unusually for them, England will delay naming their final XI until the toss, after mulling over whether to play Will Jacks or Shoaib Bashir as their spinner. The SCG pitch was still looking green less than 24 hours before the start, with Australia weighing up whether to pick off-spinner Todd Murphy, or stick with the all-seam attack they fielded in Melbourne.
Asked about the pitch, Stokes replied: ‘It’s quite a difficult one. I don’t think a groundsman’s ever been under as much pressure as the guy here this week.
‘I looked yesterday and the day before as well. We try and act like we know what we’re doing when we look down at the pitch, rubbing it and knocking it. But no one really has a clue, to be honest.’
